Hotel Vasundhra Palace Rishikesh

... Tour, Waterfall Bathing, Himalaya Caves, Lake of Tehri, Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner, Hotel Room, Photography, Rock Climbing, River Crossing, Nature of Himalaya.<br><br>http://www.uttarakhand tourntravels.com/<br><br>

... would test our calf muscles to the full. The sky once again darkened and intermittent rain accompanied us throughout the day although we were better prepared with pac-a-macs to hand. We came across a small herd of buffaloes, Elvis lookalike goats and donkeys being transported by a local family from one market to another across the hillside. With big grey monkeys swinging through the trees charting our progress, we felt a million miles from civilisation. We have made ...

... to the medications I needed. And of course he had absolutely no means of running any sort of tests of me. Instead, he did the next best thing: he gave me a medicine that is no longer used in America because of its risk of many terrible side effects and is considered a drug of last resort. It also is not useful against parasites. Sounds like a good plan. The problem was there wasn't anywhere else around here I could have gone to get the proper treatment, so I ...

... nananiiiice!), and have decided to sum up my stay by the Ganges in two parts: people and events. This is the people part. If I'm frank, it is more for myself (I like to remember the people I've met) and probably won't be all that interesting for you, my dear darling readers. I won't be offended if you don't devour this fascinating report of random people who you'll never, ever meet. Mari and Helene: I spent the majority of my time with these two, and found them to be ...

... and woke me up. Picture me banging on the connecting door and telling a monk (the Swami) to lower his music at an ashram. Yup, it happened!<br><br>You might wonder why I didn't just go somewhere else. Well, no one else had roaches, I have quite a few friends there, it's the quietest place in Rishikesh and I love waking up and walking over to do my meditation at 7am every morning and chanting every afternoon. It's a really lovely place, honestly!<br><br>The only other annoying thing was my ...

I arrived in Rishikesh after a better than expected train journey (again, the horror stories of others had made me very nervous) and a bus ride (which was about as expected!). It was about a 4 and a half hour train journey. I was sitting in a row with all other foriegners. Made friends with Esther (from England, lives in Japan) who was sitting next to me. We found the bus station in Haridwar and took the hour bus ride to Rishikesh (which ...

... s face who after twisting my arm to attend some yoga sessions at Unilever probably can't believe what she is reading right now! haha! This place is very beautiful and is on the edge of the river Ganges based along lots of mountains. The town is full of yoga schools, Ashrams, massage parlours and lots of chilled out yoga followers. I am going to attend a 2 HOUR yoga session tomorrow morning at 9.30 where the hall is on top of a ...

... to deal with on a day-to-day basis than the busy, though perhaps more dangerous, hustle-bustle of Delhi. Otherwise the train ride overall was pretty straightforward and uneventful. I arrived into Haridwar around 5.30p, was met by Ravi, my guide for this portion of the tour and the driver Rakesh and we proceeded to Rishikesh which took about 1/2hr-45 minutes. Darkness had settled in and the drive was even more harrowing than in ...

... and with our beads and heads full of hindu mysticism is the Aarti (river worship ceremony) which we have been to a couple of times sitting safely at the side. The holy man (Swarmi Chidanand Saraswati) whose face is plastered over everything sat in the middle singing and giving his sermon. On the second night after the aarti we were invited with some other westerners for an audience with his Swarminess. We were ushered into an outdoor santuary with rose ...

... incence and candle and set it in the water to be carried downstream with the others. All of this was done in front of an enormous statue of Shiva, the destroyer, one part of the Hindu Trinity (Brahma (creater), Vishnu (preserver), and Shiva (Destroyer)). This statue was white marble so that as the sun set the statue changed from white to pink to purple in hue. Very beautiful!